


Learning the Words

by Ellessey



Series: Like a Song [2]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Domestic, Family Fluff, Kid Fic, M/M, Warm and Fuzzy Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-05
Updated: 2018-05-05
Packaged: 2019-05-02 15:10:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14547444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ellessey/pseuds/Ellessey
Summary: 'She might be easily distracted, unbelievably messy, and still very fuzzy on what it means to go to bed at night and stay there until the morning, but of all the things Daichi thought might be in his future, he never could have predicted just how much he’d love this little girl, and all of the weird things she does. Mai is his daughter, too, but she’s so very much like Suga, in all the best ways.'--An epilogue toLike a Song,in which Mai is a little bit older, Daichi and Suga are a little more married, and Mai still has the biggest family (and a very patient cat) to adore her.





	Learning the Words

**Author's Note:**

> I honestly wished I could write all the way up to this point (and there's a good chance I'll pop back in to write some of the things that took place between _Like a Song_ ending, and the time of the epilogue, and maybe some things after that, too) but unfortunately limited time and daily life are things, so I wrote up to the ending I planned to get to, and then I let myself write this. We all knew Daichi and Suga were going to stay together and be the best dads in the world, but I really wanted to actually capture a little of that...so please enjoy a small peek into our boys' lives with an almost three year old Mai.

If someone had asked Daichi to put the significant events in his future in their most likely order, back when he was in high school, he probably would have placed earning a degree and beginning his career before falling in love, getting a house, and starting a family. As it turns out, falling in love happened before all of that. And becoming a father kind of did too, in spirit at least. Oikawa teased him about his dad-status frequently from the early days of his relationship with Suga—especially when Mai started talking and christened Daichi _Papa_ shortly after she started calling Suga _Dada_ —but the adoption papers weren’t actually signed until over a year after that, when Mai was two, and Daichi was finishing college.

So in a way, everything happened all at once. Except for the falling in love and the starting a family, because really, Suga and Mai were part of his family long before any papers were signed.

 _Officially,_ though, he and Suga moved into their own house just weeks after graduation. He asked Suga to marry him a couple months before that, because waiting until graduation felt far too long, all of Hikaru was already coming to visit anyway, and neither of them cared about a fancy wedding. (Daichi’s mom assured them afterwards that she cried just as much at their quiet ceremony as she would have at one that cost millions of yen, and Daichi’s dad had pretended to weep with relief at the thought of what they’d avoided.)  
  
What they _do_ care about is their proximity to their family and friends. The little house Asahi and Noya rent is near enough that they can walk on a nice day, and Kuroo and Kenma’s building is only a short bus ride away (though everyone is waiting for them to start looking for a house of their own, so Asahi can stop being nervous about how blatantly they disregard their apartment's no-pet policy). 

Daichi’s family is farther, but they're talking about moving to Tokyo any time now. They say monthly visits with their granddaughter aren’t nearly enough, and Daichi finds that perfectly reasonable, given that Mai seems to literally get cuter every single day. He’s pretty sure they’re moving here for Suga just as much as for Mai, though. They fell in love with him just as quickly as Daichi did, from the first time they all got together, when Suga was just as weird and charming and irresistible as he’s always been.

(“I can’t _believe_ I said fuck in front of your mother,” Suga had groaned, burying his face in his hands. Daichi’s mother did not give a shit, though, as she told Suga expressly when he tried to apologize before they caught their train back to the city. She and Suga were already texting each other on the way home, and Daichi still remembers the way he’d felt that night, with his mom’s messages popping up on Suga’s phone, and a five month old Mai round and warm on his lap. He thinks right then is probably when he knew for certain that he was going to marry the man beside him.)

For now, though, their house has an extra room for the grandparents when they visit, or for Daichi’s sister, or any of the many uncles. And the location has been perfect for not losing too much time getting to and from their jobs and classes. It's a comfortable commute for Daichi to the high school where he works as an athletic trainer. Suga takes most of his business classes online, but when he needs to be on campus twice a week for his evening class, it’s not too far away. And the dance studio he owns and teaches at on weekends is an easy walk in the opposite direction. One they all make frequently.

Very conveniently, the midway point between their house and the studio is an ice-cream shop. Sort of. Technically, it’s a post office, but half a block down from that is the ice-cream place, and that’s a much better rendezvous point. It does put Daichi at a disadvantage though, when he goes to meet Suga halfway, and halfway is closer to Suga than it is to him. Especially since Daichi has Mai in these cases, and while she has grown from an incredibly cute baby into a devastatingly adorable toddler, she makes it take at least ten minutes longer to get places than it ever seems like it should. On a good day.

That’s alright, though. She might be easily distracted, unbelievably messy, and still very fuzzy on what it means to go to bed at night and stay there until the morning, but she’s his Baby Mai, and of all the things he thought might be in his future, he never could have predicted just how much he’d love this little girl, and all of the weird things she does. She is his daughter, too, but she’s so very much like Suga, in all the best ways.

Just now, she’s in her bedroom, having toddled off there while Daichi was busy wrapping up a pack of catnip-stuffed mice in the living room (he doesn’t want to talk about this, or the birthday party he will grudgingly be hosting for Yuki—who, by the way, still fucking sleeps on his bed), and it’s become a little too quiet for comfort.

“Mai-chan,” he calls, smoothing on a last piece of tape. “What are you doing?”

(To be clear, this is a double cat-party. Kuroo “gifted” Yuki to them when he finally admitted defeat and adopted another cat, in hopes that she would love him like Yuki never did. And thank every good and holy thing, she actually does. He calls her Yuki’s sister, which is ludicrous because she’s a separate breed entirely, and gave them both the same fabricated birth date. Because that’s another thing—they have absolutely no idea when either of the cats were actually born. Daichi is _only_ going along with this for Mai. Just the smallest bit for Kuroo. He will never tell him that.)

“Mai?” he says again, when he hears her giggling. The chances of her not doing something naughty are extremely slim.

“Look!” she chirps, suddenly running out of her room towards him. “Papa, Papa, Papa, look!”

Daichi looks. Her round cheeks are pink, her loose curls impossibly tangled and tousled, and there’s a pair of underwear pulled on top of them. Blue, with red hearts and white unicorns. Mai has not actually fully achieved a state of being potty-trained yet, so there’s a good chance these have never even been worn. He hopes.

“What do you have there?” he asks, setting the wrapped gift aside and leaning forward on his knees.

“Hat!” Mai says, patting it proudly. “It’s a hat!”

“Beautiful,” Daichi says. “Fun fact, though. Normally that’s not where underwear goes. _Under wear_ means we wear it under something else.”

Mai blinks at him, then pulls the panties off her head and tries to jam them on his instead. “A hat for Papa,” she says.

“Ahh…Papa’s head is too big though, isn’t it? Maybe Yuki can wear it?”

Mai’s eyes light up, big and warm and the softest brown. She looks just like Suga sometimes, even with her dark hair. (Suga likes to point out that it looks just like Daichi’s, and that Mai’s fascination with stacking shogi tiles means that she’ll one day soak up all of Daichi’s skills, and joyfully play wonderful, boring games with him while Suga does absolutely anything else.)

“A party hat for Yuki!” she cries.

“Yep! Go for it,” Daichi says, kissing her cheek quickly before she hurries off in search of the cat, which he would bet good money is licking herself on top of his pillow. “Just don’t stick it around her neck!” he calls after her.

He can’t let Yuki die on her fake birthday, so he gets to his feet to follow after Mai and supervise. She ends up putting the unicorn undies back on her own head, and retrieving a new pair covered in rainbows for Yuki, who does not seem to give a shit about having the leg openings settled around her ears. She’s always been extremely tolerant of Mai, though. (She was less horrified when Mai became mobile than Asahi was. He literally had to breathe into a paper bag for a full five minutes after her first successful sequence of steps, crying in relief and pride all the while. Kuroo drew him a “World’s Best Uncle” medal after, and taped it to his chest to reward him for getting through the whole thing.)

Once they both have their “party hats” on, Daichi snaps a picture, sending it out to his mom, Suga, Asahi, Kuroo, and Oikawa all at once.

 **Suga:** where’s yours??  
**Suga:** i’ll be brutally disappointed if I don’t find something cute and pink on your head when i get home

 **Daichi:** didn’t fit, i can’t be blamed  
**Daichi:** you on your way soon? we can come meet you

 **Suga:** then you’ll have to take her hat off though

 **Daichi:** is it not appropriate to walk around town with underwear on your head? says who?

 **Suga:** lol...why don’t you give it a shot and see how it goes  
**Suga:** i’m leaving in just a few...i’ll race you!  
**Suga:** loser buys ice cream XD

 **Daichi:** unfair, Mai can’t go two feet without stopping to stare at absolutely nothing

 **Suga:** too bad so sad daicho...rocky road for me, please

 **Daichi:** we’re literally having ice cream at this asinine cat party tonight

 **Suga:** i literally don’t care (o˘◡˘o)  
**Suga:** i’ve been dancing for like 5 hours straight...feed meeee

 **Daichi:** alright..my poor hard working glutton  
**Daichi:** we’ll see you soon

 **Suga:** k! :)))

Daichi watches Mai carefully rearranging Yuki’s hat for a minute or so, until Suga is probably ready to go, then he wastes no time in using junk food as a bartering tool.

“Hey, Mai-chan. Want to go meet Daddy for ice-cream?”

“Ice-cream?”

“Yeah, we can get some ice-cream, but we gotta go if we’re gonna beat Daddy. You’re faster than him, right?”

“Yes!”

“Okay! No party hats, though. I know it's a shame, but we can’t wear underwear on our heads at the ice-cream shop.”

Mai’s bright expression falters and she pats her head again, clutching the rainbow-haired unicorns. It’s not easy, but Daichi puts his firm expression on.

“We can stay here and you can keep it on, or we can get ice cream. Your choice.”

“Hat…or ice-cream,” she repeats. She still endearingly mispronounces “ice-cream,” but he knows what she means. He thought she was cute as a baby, but he had no idea what it would be like when she started talking. Sometimes he just wants to freeze time right here, with her being not quite three, and saying _Pa-pa_ the way she does.

“That’s right. Which one?” he asks.

Mai yanks the underwear off and drops it unceremoniously on the floor. She’s already on her way to the door, so Daichi quickly pulls the pair off Yuki’s head himself.

“Happy Birthday, cat,” he says. “We’ll see you later.”

Yuki is back on his pillow before he even makes it out of the room, yawning decadently. He’s tempted to flip her off, but that's only really fun when Kuroo is here, so he saves it for later and just heads towards Mai. (He has to pause briefly when he passes her room and sees three pairs of underwear decorating Mamoru’s head. That requires a quick picture, too.)

Mai is waiting by the front door with her shoes in her hands. They have bright blue, glittery velcro straps on them, and Mai often spends a lot of time just holding them and turning them around and around, watching the light glint off the sparkles. She would do this for another fifteen minutes if he let her, but he wouldn’t put it past Suga to be running to the midway point, and Daichi isn’t going down easily.

“Come on, Baby Mai. Time to run,” he says, crouching down to fit the shoes on her little feet.

“Run!” Mai echoes. “I be Super Mai!”

Daichi grins, holding the door open for her. Kuroo and Noya frequently fly her wildly around the house, pretending she’s a superhero, and Daichi’s pretty sure she now actually believes she can both fly, and run at the speed of light. He is never going to tell her otherwise.

Suga still beats them, even though after two blocks Mai lost all interest in “running” (meandering along with the urgency of a sloth waking up from a nap) and Daichi scooped her up to fly her the rest of the way.

“This barely counts as a win,” Daichi says when they make it to where Suga’s leaning against the front of the ice-cream shop with a smug smile. He looks gorgeous and satisfied like he always does when he leaves work, hair a little sweat-damp, and cheeks flushed from the activity of leading classes all afternoon. It reminds Daichi of the way he’d look after their workout dates, especially now that his little ponytail is back, and then he wants to be touching him too badly to resist. “Hi,” he adds, after a kiss that was probably a little too long to be shared in public, with Mai sitting obliviously on his hip, playing with the pocket on the chest of his shirt.

“Hi,” Suga smiles. “I hope you brought your wallet.”

Daichi sticks his tongue out at him before Suga greets Mai, kissing her cheeks loudly and making her laugh.

“Did Papa slow you down?” he asks her, tossing a sly look at Daichi.

Mai shrugs with a secretive little smile, like that’s a very real possibility, but she doesn’t want to say it and hurt Daichi’s feelings. “Maybe,” she says. “ _I_ am fast.”

“The fastest,” Daichi agrees. “ _And_ the heaviest. Let Daddy carry you now.”

Suga obligingly transfers Mai to his own hip, then slips his free hand into Daichi’s, tugging him towards the door so they can go in and eat.

Once they’re all settled down with their ice-cream, they chat about their days, about how they might (not be able to) get out the fingerpaint that Mai smeared all over the back of the couch, and about the weekend away they have planned at the end of the month, for just the two of them. Most of their dates take place in the living room after Mai has finally fallen asleep, and Daichi likes that a lot. He doesn’t think he’ll ever get tired of sharing take-out cartons with Suga, or of pressing him down on the floor to kiss him deep and slow while music hums around them, but every once in a while they like to go out, too. Daichi even has more than one suit now.

Just before they finish eating, the song on the overhead speakers fades out and another one takes its place. Poppy and light. Starting out with just one, sweet, familiar voice.

“Daddy!” Mai cheers, immediately recognizing the old Hikaru song.

Daichi nods, ruffling Mai’s hair. “Listen to that. Daddy’s the best singer, huh?”

“And you, Papa!”

“Yeah, Papa,” Suga says, leaning into his side, his fingers finding their place between Daichi’s. “And you.”

“You don’t hear me on the radio though, do you?” Daichi says, though he feels his face warming a bit. He knows Suga loves listening to him sing to Mai. He’s caught him watching them with sleepy eyes and a soft smile, while Daichi dances Mai around the room in her nightgown.

“I hear you everywhere,” Suga says, which could mean he hears him around the house, or that he hears him in his metaphysical Suga way. Daichi doesn’t question this, he just loves it. “And that’s ten times better.”

Daichi smiles and presses a kiss to Suga’s cheek while Mai sings along with Hikaru. “If you say so,” he says.

‘“I do,” Suga says firmly, before turning to pull Mai’s hair out of her bowl of ice-cream. She’s an adorably sticky disaster by the time they’re ready to go, the song having almost reached its end. It’s at the part now where Suga’s voice soars above the other boys’.

Daichi doesn’t really like pop music, but the way Suga sings still makes his chest feel like it’s filling up with something magical. He’s found that it’s all the same, really. The feeling he gets when Suga blasts metalcore in both their ears, when Mai is giggling madly, when Suga says his name so softly in their bed at night. It’s a little like losing his footing, a little like his heart skipping a beat. Still, a little, like a tsunami.

“Ready, husband?” Suga asks. He’s standing next to him now, one hand holding Mai’s, the other held out to Daichi, open and lovely and familiar.

They have cats to go questionably celebrate, and friends to visit, and a beautiful life that came together in its own order, following its own rhythm, like a song that Daichi gets to learn the words to as it goes along.  
  
He gets to his feet with a nod, his hand fitting around Suga’s, and they let Mai lead the way out into the pink-sky evening just beginning to fall.

 

**Author's Note:**

> (Just as a sidenote...Kuroo absolutely named his cat Shogi. Daichi told him that was ridiculous, but he secretly loves it—both because he's a nerd, and because he knows Kuroo did it for him. Kenma just hid his smile behind his hand and continued to pretend he doesn't think his boyfriend's entire dynamic with his best friend is stupidly adorable.)
> 
> Thank you for reading ❤
> 
> I'm [ellessey-writes](http://ellessey-writes.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr, [karasuno123](https://twitter.com/karasuno123) on Twitter, and you can find the rest of my AO3 DaiSuga works [here](https://archiveofourown.org/works?utf8=%E2%9C%93&commit=Sort+and+Filter&work_search%5Bsort_column%5D=revised_at&work_search%5Brelationship_ids%5D%5B%5D=836528&work_search%5Bother_tag_names%5D=&work_search%5Bquery%5D=&work_search%5Blanguage_id%5D=&work_search%5Bcomplete%5D=0&user_id=Ellessey).


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